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In Davos, leaders push for cleaner energy to limit climate change

UN climate chief Christiana Figueres, speaks during an interview with the Associated Press at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2014, the opening day of the World Economic Forum where world's financial and political elite will meet in the upcoming days. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)

John Heilprin, The Associated Press
Published Wednesday, January 22, 2014 7:47AM EST
Last Updated Wednesday, January 22, 2014 6:21PM EST

DAVOS, Switzerland -- Leaders gathered in the Swiss ski resort of Davos are pushing for nations worldwide to shift to cleaner energy sources as the best way to contain global warming and re-energize the global economy.

UN climate chief Christiana Figueres, reflecting the top billing that climate change has in Davos this year, said the world economy is at risk unless a binding deal is agreed in Paris in 2015 to lower heat-trapping carbon emissions from coal and oil.

"It is important that we get the treaty because the signal to the markets, the signal to the global economy, needs to be stronger than it is right now," she said in an Associated Press interview on Wednesday.

Nations emerged from climate talks in Poland in November with a vague road map on how to prepare for a global climate pact to stabilize warming at 2 degrees Celsius, a level countries hope will avoid the worst consequences of climate change.

Figueres says she sees "momentum growing toward this" as countries like China reduce coal use to clear polluted skies and Indonesia plants more trees to protect water resources, seeing that it's in their national interest to develop more sustainably.

Scientists say man-made climate change is likely to worsen starvation, poverty, lack of water, flooding, heat waves, droughts and diseases, raising the spectre of more conflict and war, unless drastic action is taken to lower emissions of carbon dioxide from the burning of coal, oil and gas from their current trajectories.

The global economy may continue to grow, scientists say, but if the global temperature reaches about 3 degrees F warmer than now, it could lead to worldwide economic losses between 0.2 and 2.0 per cent of income.

A World Economic Forum report says the failure to mitigate and adapt to climate change is one of the top 10 risks facing the world in 2014. The Davos forum this year also emphasizes inequality by income, gender and access to resources.

South Korea's President Park Geun-hye said climate change is a problem that will take creativity to overcome.

"Climate change and environmental challenges are global in nature. As such the world must act as one in tackling them," she said.

Disputes between countries over who should bear the burden of cutting industrial emissions have long been a barrier to action, though many argue the benefits of cleaner energy outweigh the costs of conversion.

Indian Finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram said he couldn't say whether his country would sign on to a treaty at this point. Developing economies can't be asked to shoulder most of the burden, he told reporters in Davos, and the enormous amount of financial support that rich industrialized nations promised in aid for adapting to a warmer world "is simply not forthcoming."

Al Gore was the headliner at a private session on how leaders can help prevent -- and better communicate -- catastrophic effects on public health, anti-poverty efforts, clean water and energy supplies from a rise in global temperatures above 4 degrees F.

"The climate conversation has to be won by those who are willing to speak up," he told them. "It is a race against time, but we are going to win."

The World Wildlife Fund, known as WWF, is among groups calling on governments to commit to action.

"There's a rising recognition that we simply have to find a way to break through," Jim Leape, director general of Geneva-based WWF International, told AP. "The big governments each need to renew their commitment."